Nokia, VNPT team up to deploy first 10G broadband in Vietnam

Nokia and VNPT will conduct the first deployment of 10G fiber broadband in Vietnam, providing connections to 10,000 homes and businesses in the eight biggest localities of the Southeast Asian nation, the Finnish tech giant announced on Tuesday.

The Finnish firm will provide fiber access nodes for the operator’s exchanges and fiber modems for end users. With the new technology, VNPT will offer customers a full choice of internet speed of up to 10 Gbits per second on the existing platform without having to install new fiber.

The project is VNPT’s first step towards high-class fiber-to-the-x (FTTx) services, which fulfill residential and business customers’ demand for higher bandwidth and service quality using the latest generation of 10 Gigabit Symmetrical Passive Optical Network (XGS-PON), said Dang Anh Son, CEO at VNPT Net Corporation.

“VNPT will work with Nokia to deploy cloud-based network management systems for the XGS-PON and enhance customer experiences through digital transformation solutions,” he added.

The state-owned telecom group VNPT reported an after-tax profit of VND6.63 trillion ($280 million) in 2022, exceeding its annual target by 4.6%. The telco's total revenue reached VND55.21 trillion ($2.34 billion), up 2% year-on-year and fullfilling 97.5% of the year's goal. VNPT's broadband service revenue maintained a growth rate of 6% in 2022.

Nokia is a long-term partner of telcos in Vietnam. In August 2022, VNPT and Nokia signed an agreement to promote private wireless (LTE/5G) deployment and solutions for smart ports and airports.

In September 2019, Nokia and Viettel, the biggest telecommunications business in Vietnam, broadcast the first end-to-end 5G network in Ho Chi Minh City. The launch positions Vietnam head-to-head with other countries in the region looking for an early commercial 5G rollout.

In February 2023, Nokia announced the completion of Vietnam’s first Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDN) network with Viettel, a move that will “dramatically” increase capacity for the operator. This new Data Center Interconnect solution will enable Viettel to meet future requirements for low-latency, high-capacity, robust network for 5G, Cloud, and growing consumer demand for online video and internet usage, Nokia said.

Also in February, at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2023 in Barcelona, Spain, Nokia and Vietnamese telecom giant MobiFone signed a cooperation deal. Nokia will assist MobiFone with 5G technology and the export of infrastructure into the cloud, fix-wireless access service on its 5G platform, and commercialization of the latter’s 5G network.

Vietnam had 21.86 million fixed broadband subscribers as of the end of April, equivalent to 22 subscribers per 100 citizens, up 8.76% year-on-year, according to the Ministry of Information and Communications. The ratio of households using optical-fiber cable for internet connection was 76.68%, up by 6.68 percentage points year-on-year.

The country’s information-communications technology sector reaped a revenue of VND1,139.3 trillion ($48.49 billion) in the January-April period, the ministry added. The April figure was VND313.48 trillion ($13.34 billion), down 1% year-on-year.